My apologies for the long break between postings- it turned out that I only could go into town when there was a Need instead of just "oh we go in on a regular basis" because we didn't want to leave the campsite/station unattended if we could help it (and I was the only other person there besides the head person), and then when I went in it was either shower OR have internet, not I meant to update once I got back to my boss's house before leaving, and then at the airport and once I got home, but...I was busier than expected.

So, without further ado, chapter 9!

Plagg was being worked harder than ever, and he wasn't even being properly compensated for it. Whenever they could fit it into their schedules, Adrien and Ladybug were going over to Fu's- sometimes together, sometimes individually- to try to figure out how to access the new powers that Fu had decided could come in handy for them during the final attack. Puzzling things out involved a lot of transforming, detransforming, and consultation with both Master Fu and the kwamis, with only minimal Camembert offered for refueling. He wasn't even being given enough time to digest his food in peace.

It was taking forever. Or, well, maybe it was just a week, but it felt like forever. Besides, Plagg had never concerned himself too much with silly human constructs of time.

"Why are we even bothering with this?" Plagg complained as Adrien prepared to transform for the fifth time in an hour. "You already have a plan pretty much laid out for the final battle, and you'd only really need your original powers for that. I could be sleeping right now. Or eating cheese, since I've been deprived of it the last few days!"

"We cannot predict everything about the final battle," Fu told Plagg. "Perhaps Mr. Agreste will try to transform and fight, and then we will have to have more tricks at our disposal. Perhaps not. It is safer for them to be prepared."

Plagg scowled as he was sucked back into the ring.

When he wasn't at Fu's place, Plagg was expected to keep an ear open around the house to make sure that Mr. Agreste hadn't noticed any differences between the old artifacts and the new ones. He was also supposed to try to talk to Nooroo more, though why he had to do both was beyond Plagg.

Surely Nooroo would notice if Mr. Agreste spotted anything wrong with his precious collection of ill-gotten Miraculous memorabilia. After all, the man knew how to throw a hissy fit over the smallest things.

And on top of that, Mr. Agreste was stepping it up with his akumas. They were coming more often than usual, it seemed, or maybe it was just that the fights themselves took longer to finish. Plagg had tried retaliating by making Mr. Agreste's elevator break again, this time grinding to a stop only seconds after starting up, but afterwards Fu had ordered a halt to further breaks for the moment, concerned that too much might make Mr. Agreste suspicious. Adrien and Ladybug would just have to deal with the momentary uptick in attacks like normal.

Plagg was looking forward to when this was over and he could just nap and eat all day. Lately there had been far too much researching and having to be comforting and paying attention to his surroundings. It was all too much working and not enough lazing around in a warm sunbeam with a large chunk of Camembert at his side.

And speaking of this being all over, Plagg wanted to know why it was taking so darn long. How many times did Adrien have to practice activating his dialed-back Cataclysm, and how many times did Ladybug have to practice the spell that gave her two yo-yos instead of one?

"So when are we asking Ladybug's parents to be temporary holders?" Plagg demanded at their next meeting. "And when are we doing the reveal? Don't tell me that we're waiting until after Hawkmoth is defeated. That would be stupid." He glared at Master Fu, daring him to disagree. It was obvious that Adrien would need the full support of his partner to get through the final battle with Hawkmoth.

"If we're going to involve my parents, a reveal is bound to happen anyway," Ladybug agreed. Plagg watched as her hand snaked around the screen to find Adrien's and squeeze it lightly. She had been doing that more and more often, ever since she had heard that Chat Noir's home life was maybe not great, and of course Adrien wasn't going to reject the small comfort. "And there isn't that much time between now and when we want to try to recover the Miraculous. What are the odds that we'll just happen to get an akuma with secret-revealing powers or something?"

"See, Ladybug agrees with me," Plagg said immediately. He knew that Adrien was likely to be miserable after this particular meeting, and having someone who understood what he was going through to hang out with would help. Besides, Plagg wasn't sure how many more pranks and misfortunes he could play on Mr. Agreste to cheer Adrien up before he either started getting suspicious or started taking it out on the household staff and Adrien.

"As do I," Tikki chimed in. Wayzz nodded.

"Okay then, I suppose a reveal is in order," Fu said. He was smiling slightly. "Take off your helmets and go meet your partner."

Ladybug yanked off her voice-changing helmet immediately, dropping it to the side as she scooted forward. Adrien pulled his own helmet more slowly, biting his lip as he did. He looked oddly nervous for someone who had wanted to know Ladybug's identity for so long. Plagg watched as Adrien closed his eyes, taking in a nervous breath.

Ladybug had no such reservations. She peered curiously around the screen and then her eyes widened.

"Adrien!"

Adrien yelped as Ladybug pounced on him, knocking him backwards onto the floor in a hug. Seconds later, there was a surprised "Marinette?" followed by an incredibly excited "Marinette! Hey!"

...oh, right. That was her name. Plagg probably should have known that, in all honestly.

Plagg rolled his eyes as Adrien practically wrapped himself around his friend, beaming the entire time. Marinette didn't seem at all bothered as she hugged him back. Tikki was spinning around them, chirping happily.

"I take it that you're happy with your partner?" Fu asked, clearly amused as Adrien flopped on top of Marinette. "You two seem quite close."

"We've been friends for most of the year," Adrien managed as he and Marinette untangled themselves and sat up again. Marinette was practically in Adrien's lap as they settled back down. "And we've been even better friends recently, and of course we're, like, super-friends as Ladybug and Chat Noir."

Marinette actually giggled. "Super-friends?"

Adrien just grinned at her.

"I'm glad to hear that," Fu said cheerfully. "It'll be good for you to have some support now, more than ever."

For once, Adrien didn't seem bothered by the reminder that they would be getting his father arrested soon. Instead, he nodded cheerfully. "Yeah! And I love Marinette's parents, too. They're super-nice. I won't mind them knowing about me at all."

"And they'll be willing to have you stay with us after, y'know, everything," Marinette added, winding her arm around Adrien's. "I know they will. We'll find somewhere in the house for you to stay, even if it means dividing my room up."

Adrien looked absolutely moved. Plagg made a face. If Adrien stayed with Marinette at all, then Plagg would no doubt be subjected to hearing endless flirting between the two. On the other hand, Adrien wouldn't be able to spend hours waxing poetic about "his Lady" if she was within hearing range, which was an absolute relief.

Once the meeting was over, Adrien stayed glued to Marinette's side as they waved good-bye to Fu and headed for the door.

"Do- do you want to hang out for a bit?" Adrien asked somewhat nervously as they stepped out of Fu's building. "I mean, I would understand if you're busy, but..."

"Do you want to do a homework-video game hangout?" Marinette suggested. "Then we can be responsible and have some fun."

Plagg groaned loudly. "You two are boring. Can't we do something else, like go to the grocery store and get cheese? Or go to the movies and get popcorn?"

"I'm going to go with the responsible option," Adrien said, making Plagg groan. Of course his boy would go with the boring thing. The boring, non-cheesy thing. And the non-popcorn-y thing. "I have some homework that I need to finish, especially if we're going to be talking to your parents soon. I'll probably be too nervous about how that's going to go to get anything done that day."

"You'll be nervous? I'm probably going to be a nervous wreck!" Marinette countered as they rounded the corner and headed up the next street side-by-side. "I'm just really hoping that they don't try to stop me from being Ladybug."

"I thought you said that they supported the superheroes!"

"Yeah, but that's because they don't know who we are! I'm worried that they'll get hung up on the fact that I'm in danger a lot," Marinette said. "Though hopefully the fact that we're going to take down Hawkmoth and stop the akumas will help."

"I'm sure your parents will be proud of you," Adrien assured her, fingers brushing up her arm. His eyes had turned soft and gooey and gross as he looked at Marinette. "They might be worried, but they can't deny that pretty much the entire city looks up to you, Bugaboo."

From inside of Adrien's coat, Plagg pulled a face. Ugh. The flirting out of costume was starting already. And it was actually working, too. Ladybug- er, Marinette- was blushing.

"They'll be proud of you too, you know," Marinette said quietly. Plagg peered out of Adrien's jacket to see her reaching over to take his hand. He gagged quietly when he saw Adrien turning pink again and gazing at his friend with a sickeningly soft look on his face, and then promptly stopped when he spotted Tikki glaring at him from Marinette's purse.

And now he had to actually behave in the face of their Chosens' ooey-gooey-mushiness. Either that, or sleep and risk missing any cheesy treats that his Chosen might pass his way.

A few more giggles came from up above as the duo bantered, and Plagg buried himself in Adrien's inner jacket pocket. His decision had been made, it seemed. No amount of cheese was worth having to listen to that for however many hours Adrien was planning to hang out with Marinette.

"I was worried that Ladybug would treat me differently after she found out that I'm Hawkmoth's son," Adrien admitted as he dug in the fridge to pull out a chunk of Camembert for Plagg to take after they were summoned back to the mansion. "But it's Marinette, and she's been spending even more time with me than normal since she found out that Father is Hawkmoth. She hasn't treated me differently at all." Then his face took on a dreamy quality, and even burying his face in his cheese didn't keep Plagg from hearing Adrien. "And she's so brave, and kind, and sweet, and talented, and of course she's Ladybug, she's perfect."

...maybe Plagg should have considered the possibility of this happening before supporting the idea of an identity reveal. Something told him that Adrien was going to be doing a lot more gushing than usual now. What he had had to deal with earlier was just the tip of the iceberg. And unlike earlier, he wouldn't be able to just sleep through all of the disgusting gushing and flirting. He could escape some of it like that, but not all of it. He would end up missing out on too much cheese if he tried to avoid all of the gushing.

"And she said that she would be willing to give up part of her room so I could stay there!" Adrien practically swooned onto his bed as Plagg tried and failed to block him out by sacrificing chunks of cheese to use as earplugs. "I mean, I know her parents would have to agree, but just imagine how amazing that would be! I wouldn't even mind having only a small space to myself. Marinette's parents are always so welcoming, and the whole place smells amazing, and there's actually people around who care about me, and-" Adrien seemed absolutely breathless. "Even if I end up only going over there during the day, I just love being there."

Plagg just made a mmm-hmm noise and tried to block out Adrien's voice by burying himself in Adrien's garbage can under a few Camembert wrappers. It didn't work.

"Her parents are always so nice, and they always have awesome snacks for us, and they actually look happy to see me there." Adrien seemed stuck on how much Marinette's parents liked him, which made sense. He didn't get that same happy welcome when he came back to his own home. "I'm glad that they'll be the ones to know about Mari and I. Like, I bet that they'll be worried about us being in danger and all, but I bet they'll be supportive after they get over that."

"So you're going to go over there again?" Plagg asked, tugging the chunks of cheese out of his ears as he finally gave up on blocking out his Chosen. It seemed rather fruitless, after all. He considered the former cheese earplugs for a second, then shrugged and popped them in his mouth. There was no point in wasting perfectly good Camembert, after all.

Adrien perked up. "Yeah, tomorrow! And then the day after that is when Master Fu is going to come over and talk to Marinette's parents about becoming temporary holders, so I'll be going over there after basketball and hopefully staying for dinner after Fu drops by."

"Your other friends are going to notice if you're suddenly attached to Marinette," Plagg pointed out, mostly because Adrien was going starry-eyed again. "And if you're over there all of the time..."

"It's safer at Marinette's house than it is here," Adrien pointed out. "And if we're together when an akuma attacks, then we can go together. And who cares if they notice? That's hardly a bad thing."

Clearly trying to keep Adrien from being a starry-eyed lovesick idiot was a losing battle. Sighing, Plagg dove back into his trashcan cheese-wrapper nest.

It was going to be a long evening.

Before they knew it, the day for Marinette's parents to be told about the Miraculous had arrived. Marinette had been increasingly nervous all day, and Plagg had been kept awake throughout Adrien's entire basketball practice by the frequent buzzing of incoming texts from Marinette. Adrien had cracked a smile when he was done with practice and found how many texts she had sent him.

"I'm glad that I'll be with her when Master Fu is there," Adrien told Plagg as he left the school building and headed across the street to the bakery. Plagg had opted to ride in Adrien's jacket, mostly because his bag smelled like sweaty teenaged boy and if he had to be in that bag for longer than a few seconds, he would lose his appetite. "It sounds like she's practically bouncing off of the walls already, and there's another hour and a half yet before he's supposed to arrive."

"Great, you can both be nervous together," Plagg snarked. He sniffed as Adrien pushed open the bakery's door. "Say, did you forget to put on more deodorant after practice? You smell."

"I'm sorry, we're clo- oh, Adrien, dear!" Plagg heard Sabine exclaim, and then seconds later Plagg was being squished as she hugged Adrien. "Go on up, Marinette is waiting for you. Tom and I will be joining you in a few minutes, once we finish cleaning and closing the bakery for the day. Oh! Let me pack a bag for you first. We were busy today so we don't have quite as many leftovers as usual, but we still have a few croissants and some cookies."

Plagg drooped. No cheese bread? What was the point of coming over if there wasn't any cheese bread?

"Thank you, Madam Cheng," Adrien said politely. A moment later, he was being shooed upstairs.

"No cheese bread?" Plagg complained as Adrien practically sprinted up the stairs. "Aww."

"I'll buy some during lunch tomorrow," Adrien promised. He skidded to a halt in front of Marinette's living room door. "Wait, were you serious about me smelling before? Hang on a second, I gotta smell-"

Adrien's elbow was raised and his nose was halfway to his armpit when Marinette whipped the door open. "Adrien? Hey!"

Adrien hastily snapped his arm back down to his side (Plagg snickered) and flashed a wide (if slightly maniacal and forced) grin at his partner. "Hi! I, uh- I was just about to knock?"

Marinette looked a little puzzled. Tikki was giggling.

"Do you have cheese?" Plagg asked when it became obvious that Adrien was floundering hopelessly. He popped out of Adrien's jacket to perch on his head. "There wasn't any cheese bread left, and we ran out of cheese after the attack earlier."

"I don't know," Marinette told him, and Plagg pouted. How could anyone not know if they had cheese or not at any given time? It was a travesty. "But we can check."

Plagg perked up and floated after her as she led the way into the apartment. He glanced back to see Adrien hastily sniffing his armpits before following, and Plagg smirked.

Adrien hadn't smelled bad at all. Plagg just enjoyed freaking him out.

"I think the Cheddar is being reserved for dinner tonight," Marinette said, bringing Plagg's attention back to her. "But we do have cottage cheese, if you want?"

Cottage cheese? It was bland. Boring. Bleh. But it was cheese. "I suppose."

Marinette spooned up a bit of the cottage cheese for Plagg to have while Adrien brought his bag upstairs to Marinette's room. As he trotted back down the stairs, his stomach growled. Loudly.

"Maybe we should have a snack before dinner," Marinette suggested. "Anyone interested in popcorn?"

"I like popcorn," Plagg said immediately, popping out of his licked-clean bowl and watching as Marinette got out a pan and some oil. "Make it nice and buttery!"

"Popcorn would be great," Adrien agreed. "Anything I can do to help?"

Marinette nodded and pointed to a high cupboard. "Yeah, we keep the kernels up there. I can't quite reach them without a chair, but..."

"But I can, because I'm not short like you," Adrien teased. Plagg watched with amusement as Marinette swatted at his side, then he turned his attention to the pan Marinette was heating up. It didn't take long for the first batch of popcorn to come off of the stove and get poured into a bowl. Plagg vibrated with excitement as Marinette poured in the butter and salt as Adrien shook the bowl, and then zipped past Adrien as soon as he set the bowl down to dive into the bowl for a piece. He hummed his appreciation as soon as the popcorn hit his tongue. "It's tasty. The only thing that could possibly make it better would be cheese, of course."

Marinette paused in her pouring of the next batch of kernels into the hot pan. "There's cheese powders that you can put on popcorn, you know. We have a white cheddar one, I think."

Plagg perked up immediately. Cheesy popcorn? That sounded amazing. This whole knowing-identities thing wasn't so bad after all.

Ten minutes later, they were all settled back in Marinette's room with their popcorn. Plagg had an entire bowl all to himself, drenched in butter and coated thoroughly with the cheese powder. And it was divine. By the time Fu showed up, Plagg was in a cheese-induced haze on Marinette's desk, unable (well, mostly unwilling) to be disturbed.

"How'd it go?" Plagg slurred sleepily a while later as Adrien and Marinette clambered back up into the room after their little meeting. He had been vaguely aware of Adrien briefly trying to wake him up before they went down, but his Chosen had apparently (correctly) decided that it was a lost cause.

"It went really well," Marinette said, beaming. "My parents had agreed to help before Master Fu even mentioned that I was Ladybug. They were worried, of course, but Adrien was right in thinking that the fact that we've got a plan to take Hawkmoth down would help."

"We're going to have dinner in five minutes," Adrien told Plagg as Marinette gathered up the popcorn bowls. He looked happy, and Plagg had to wonder how many hugs he had gotten from Marinette's parents. "And we'll be having a dinner here with Master Fu the night before we get the Butterfly miraculous back, just for last-minute planning and so Marinette's father can try transforming."

"We decided on this weekend," Marinette added on. "My mom got the Fox miraculous and Trixx earlier and already transformed once. We thought maybe we would do next weekend instead to give her more time to transform a few more times and work on her Mirage before facing Mr. Agreste, but she said she would work really hard on it with the days we have left so we could end things sooner."

Adrien looked simultaneously ill and glad about that. Plagg suspected that he was glad that things would be over soon, at least, and that he wouldn't have to keep risking life and limb fighting akumas, but he was probably concerned about the fallout once his father was in jail. He was potentially also not looking forward to putting his father in jail, but Plagg didn't understand why. Mr. Agreste hadn't acted like a father for- well, Plagg didn't know how long, but it had been ages, at least. In Plagg's opinion, Adrien shouldn't care about his father anymore at all.

Humans were so weird sometimes with their strange attachments to others who weren't worth their time.

"We're going downstairs now to help my parents get things ready," Marinette added. "If you want to come down, you can. Tikki is chatting with my dad right now."

Plagg considered it. He could stay up here and nap, or he could go downstairs and see if he could squirrel away any more cheese. He probably wouldn't be able to eat it right away- he was pretty stuffed still from the cheesy popcorn- but it never hurt to have a stash.

He followed Adrien back downstairs. There, he found a fox cooking dinner while Tom arranged chairs and set out place mats and silverware at the table. Plagg sniffed and then pouted.

There wasn't any cheese.

Movement caught his eye, and Plagg glanced over to see Ladybug and Chat Noir standing in one corner of the room, apparently talking. Plagg looked again and saw that the two "superheroes" were ever-so-slightly translucent, their movements were a little stilted, the edges were a bit blurred, and they were making wispy little sounds instead of actual words. They were a Fox mirage, and beginner ones at that.

Marinette's mother would surely get better at it quickly, especially with focus, but maybe they should consider Tom as the Turtle taking the lead with the talking. That was usually the hardest part to master.

At most, Marinette's mom would be able to imitate Ladybug's voice, since she would be most familiar with it.

Soon enough they were sitting down to dinner. Sabine had detransformed after her timer ran out, making her illusions dissolve and vanish, and Trixx stole a hunk of bread before flying over to join Tikki and Plagg. Even in his drowsy state, Plagg could sense the curiosity coming from Marinette's parents.

"How did you discover Hawkmoth's identity?" Sabine asked after several minutes of quiet eating. She glanced towards Adrien. "You don't have to tell me if you don't want to, but..."

"No, actually, it's pretty funny," Adrien said. He flashed a small grin. "Plagg decided to dress up in a costume made to look like the Butterfly kwami, Nooroo, so he could sneak into the kitchens for cheese without being mistaken for a rat if he got spotted. My father had injured his eye that day and could barely see, so he mistook Plagg for his kwami."

"I had been so confused about how they had accidentally discovered that Hawkmoth was Mr. Agreste before I found out that Chat Noir is Adrien," Marinette added with a grin at Adrien. "Tikki was still trying to keep me from guessing my kitty was Adrien, so she suggested that Chat Noir just lived nearby and Plagg couldn't find enough cheese in his house, so he broke into the mansion kitchen instead."

Adrien's lips twitched in amusement and he tried to hide it by taking a quick bite of food.

"So I had this weird mental picture of Plagg dressing up for the express purpose of breaking into neighboring houses for more cheese," Marinette finished. "And I was super-puzzled about how he just happened to go into the Agreste mansion on the one day that Mr. Agreste just happened to be having eye problems."

Marinette's parents laughed. Adrien swallowed his bite of food and grinned.

"By the way, Plagg, don't you go getting any ideas about breaking into neighboring houses for more cheese," Adrien added. "I give you plenty."

Plagg just sniffed. He wouldn't consider that anyway- there was plenty of cheese in the Agreste kitchen, after all. As long as the chefs kept the fridge well-stocked, he would behave.

Well, as much as he ever behaved, anyway.

For the rest of the week, Adrien (and by extension, Plagg) spent as much time as he could manage at the Dupain-Cheng's house. Sometimes he and Marinette manned the front counter so Sabine could have more time to practice her Mirage so it would look solid and believable by the time they approached Mr. Agreste.

Plagg could tell that Adrien's behavior was starting to catch Nathalie's attention- it would be hard for it not to, since Adrien had to ask her permission to have dinner over at Marinette's house, and even to go over to his partner's house in the first place. He was willing to bet that she was going to ask for some sort of explanation soon, and Adrien was likely going to flounder his way through that conversation.

And he was right.

"You've been going over to this girl's house every day this week," Nathalie commented after Adrien asked for permission to go to the Dupain-Cheng's house for lunch and dinner on Thursday following breakfast. Her sharp eyes scanned Adrien's expression. "...any particular reason why?"

Adrien froze.

"Adrien?" Nathalie prompted.

"Just say that she's your girlfriend," Plagg hissed from Adrien's pocket. He didn't want Mr. Agreste hearing about Adrien avoiding the house and suddenly becoming suspicious. If Adrien claimed a girlfriend, he would probably investigate Marinette to make sure that she was "suitable"- or, rather, he would try to. Considering that he would likely be in jail in two days, it wouldn't really matter that much. Adrien flushed red at the suggestion, and Plagg sighed.

Hopeless. His Chosen was completely hopeless. Plagg was pretty certain that once Adrien and Marinette finally got their heads on straight and started dating, they would be ridiculously blushy and soppy and of course, Plagg would be forced to sit through it all.

Blech.

"Adrien?" Nathalie prompted again. She looked utterly baffled by Adrien's red cheeks. "You've been spending a lot of time at your classmate's house. Any particular reason why?"

"Girlfriend!" Plagg hissed again, kicking Adrien's chest. Adrien jumped.

"Girlfriend!" Adrien blurted out in an embarrassingly high-pitched voice. Nathalie's eyebrows shot up, and Adrien shrunk in on himself slightly and cleared his throat. "I- I mean. She's my girlfriend, and her family is really, really nice. And they've invited me over."

Plagg was almost proud of Adrien for that. Actual words, in an actual sentence, in a fairly normal tone. All he had to work on was not squeaking out nonsense first.

Nathalie nodded, face back to expressionless normal. "I see. And are you sure that you aren't encroaching? You've been there for most meals this week."

"They always invited me first," Adrien protested immediately. Plagg could feel some uncertainty radiating off him, though, and he rolled his eyes. The Dupain-Chengs didn't mind Adrien eating at their house at all, and in fact Plagg could tell that they quite enjoyed having him over. There was no need for any uncertainty.

"I'll have the chef prepare a fruit basket or something that I can bring over," Nathalie decided. "Some meats, maybe. Just so they aren't spending a ton more on grocery bills with feeding you and so I can meet your girlfriend's parents. You said that your girlfriend is the Dupain-Cheng girl, right? From the bakery?"

Adrien just nodded stiffly. Plagg rolled his eyes. Did he have to do everything around here?

"She won the bowler hat competition!" Plagg hissed. Adrien repeated him robotically, and Nathalie looked impressed.

"A talented girl, then. Though-" Something seemed to occur to Nathalie, and she frowned briefly. "Hm. Perhaps I'm thinking of someone else. I can't go over this morning because we have a meeting, but I should have time this afternoon." She glanced briefly at her tablet and frowned. "You should get going, Adrien. School starts soon."

Adrien obediently got going, though his face was still flaming.

Plagg napped throughout the morning, occasionally waking up to snack on the cheese Adrien had packed. He properly roused himself when the bell rang for lunch, and looked up to find Adrien's face pink.

What he had missed Plagg didn't know, but he didn't really care. Marinette had probably flirted with Adrien or something, or maybe Nino had teased Adrien about the amount of staring at Marinette that he was doing.

Adrien grew increasingly fidgety as he and Marinette headed over to the Dupain-Cheng's bakery. It was almost as though he was uncomfortable, which didn't make any sense. He loved the Dupain-Chengs.

Meh. He wasn't going to worry about it. Adrien was weird sometimes. Besides, Tom had cheese bread for him.

"You've been fidgeting since you got here, son," Tom said with a laugh as he handed sandwiches to Adrien and Marinette. "Something on your mind?"

Adrien turned even redder and slouched in his chair, avoiding Tom's gaze. "I, uh..."

Marinette turned and fixed Adrien with an interested look. Adrien's gaze darted away from her and he practically fidgeted right off of his chair.

"Nathalie was asking me about why I was spending all of my time over here this morning!" Adrien finally blurted out after several seconds of silence. Suddenly something clicked in Plagg's mind. Aha. So that was what he was so concerned about.

Dork.

"And I didn't want to make her suspicious," Adrien continued, his voice slowly inching higher and higher in pitch and words spilling out faster and faster as he talked. "And Plagg told me to just tell her thatMarinetteandIweredating."

The last few words came out in such a rush that it clearly took Marinette and her father several seconds to decipher it. When they did, Marinette turned bright red and Tom let out a booming laugh.

"If you wanted to date her, all you had to do was ask. I doubt she would say no."

Now both teens were flushed red.

"Nathalie is going to be coming over with a basket of food this afternoon," Plagg volunteered helpfully when it became apparent that both Adrien and Marinette were apparently incapable of forming words at the moment. "Because Adrien's been eating over so often. And she wanted to make sure that Adrien wasn't overstaying his welcome."

Tom scoffed at that. "Don't be ridiculous. I'm pretty certain that it would be impossible for Adrien to overstay his welcome."

That got a smile from Adrien.

"But I'll make sure to tell Sabine that you're apparently dating so that we don't accidentally tip Nathalie off by acting confused," Tom continued, sounding quite pleased with himself when the teens looked flustered. Apparently he took great pleasure from teasing Adrien and Marinette. Plagg approved.

"What did Nathalie say about it when you told her that we were d-dating?" Marinette asked after Tom had gone back downstairs, humming merrily. She looked a bit anxious.

Adrien shrugged. The pink hadn't completely faded from his cheeks. "She was surprised, I think. I don't know. It's hard to tell with Nathalie sometimes."

Plagg could pick up a spike of anxiety from Marinette, but to her credit, she didn't outwardly react at all.

An akuma attack took up the majority of the rest of their lunch period (Plagg mourned having to leave his cheese bread behind, even though they would be back for it after classes were over), and then they were back at school.

Boring? Yes, maybe. But it gave him plenty of time to savor the gorgeous chunk of goat cheese that Tom had given him.

Plagg was just dozing off when school let out for the day. He perked up- he could finish his cheese bread once they got back over to Marinette's house!- and waited impatiently as Adrien talked and joked with Nino at his locker. They headed outside excruciatingly slowly, discussing something that had happened in class earlier in the day.

Plagg pouted from his place inside of Adrien's bag. As much as he wanted to prod Adrien in the side to get him to hurry up because the abandoned cheese bread was calling Plagg's name, he didn't. Adrien needed the sense of normalcy right now.

Tikki would be so proud of Plagg right now, he was positive. Here he was, putting his Chosen's need for company over his own need for cheese.

"Uh, is that Nathalie?" Plagg heard Nino ask, and Adrien stiffened. Plagg peered out of Adrien's bag. Sure enough, Nathalie stood right outside of the bakery, and she was talking to Marinette. Marinette didn't look at all bothered, even though Nathalie was clearly in intimidation mode. After a moment, Nathalie nodded, flashed what might have been a small smile, and then stepped into the waiting car. The door closed, and then the car pulled away. "I wonder what she wanted."

Adrien just looked concerned.

After another couple minutes, Nino headed off home and Adrien made a beeline for the bakery. Marinette was inside, helping her parents refill the shelves.

"I saw Nathalie talking to you," Adrien said immediately, rushing to help Marinette. He looked concerned. "What did she want?"

"She remembered that I was the one who returned your father's book," Marinette explained quietly as they sidestepped a customer. "And when I returned it, I had said that I had taken it, instead of Lila. I figured that that would make it more believable." She shrugged. "Nathalie remembered that, and that was what she confronted me about. I just told her the truth- well, I didn't say anything about Tikki telling me to take the book in the first place- and said that I simplified it so your father would be more likely to let you return to school, because if there were too many steps involved then he might think that I was lying to protect you."

"Oh, no wonder she seemed a little taken aback when she realized who you were," Adrien realized. "I told her- well, Plagg told her through me, technically- that you were the one to win the hat contest. I think that put a face to the name, and then-"

"Then she realized that I was the one who "stole" the book from you," Marinette finished. She winced. "And was concerned about it, probably rightly so. I might have gone a little over the top with the fangirl angle to try to be convincing."

"Did she believe you this time?"

Marinette nodded. "Yeah, I think so. It probably didn't make sense to her that you would date the 'superfan' kind of person I had pretended to be the first time around."

"Or that I would be friends with a 'superfan' for so long," Adrien added. Then he grinned and poked Marinette's side. "Though I have to ask- aren't you a fan of mine, Buginette? Be-claws I'm certainly a fan of yours."

"I like you too, kitty-cat," Marinette said fondly, hip-bumping him as she unloaded a tray of bread into an almost empty basket. "And I think I got Nathalie's stamp of approval, too. She seemed to appreciate that I stuck my head out like that for you with the book."

"I appreciate it, too," Adrien said, grinning at her. "And yeah, I think my father probably wouldn't have believed you if you said that Lila took the book and that you followed her until you could get it. He would rather believe that I just lost the book than believe that it changed hands several times."

Adrien and Marinette took over for Sabine then, alternating between working the counter and doing homework with occasional breaks to fetch trays of freshly baked goods from the kitchen in back, while Plagg went upstairs with Tikki to watch Sabine transform and practice.

Or, rather, for Tikki to watch Sabine and offer suggestions. Plagg snacked and took a nap in a lovely sunbeam.

The rest of Thursday passed in a cheerful blur. Plagg got a lovely baked Brie for dinner (apparently the cheese was a gift from Nathalie and it didn't fit in the fridge anyway; Plagg heartily approved of the use), and then Adrien and Marinette finished off their homework and then played video games before Adrien and Plagg had to go back to the mansion.

Adrien didn't sleep very well that night. The tossing and turning kept Plagg up as well, and Plagg worried.

If this was what Adrien like two nights before they were scheduled to take down Hawkmoth, how bad was he going to be the night before the final showdown?

A/N: Aaaay only one more chapter of the main story to go (though there are three side stories left, I believe).

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